Affectionate
by elenathehun
Summary: Kyrn was not averse to marrying Jag.


**Done on TF.N for Valentine's Day '05. The pairing is Kyrn/Jag.**

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She was not unhappy with him.

The marriage was not unexpected, after all. He was a rising star in the military, already well respected for his tactics and strategy during the many wars they fought. She was a member of a more prominent family in the House, and a good commander in her own rights. They were friends, and had worked together for most of their careers. They both assented to the marriage contract drawn up by their parents.

They were married a year later in a n austere religious ceremony. His mother brought ryshcate. She tried to ignore the fact that his mother wasn't crying out of happiness.

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She found, over the years living with him, that he was more human than she had thought. But her people were not as emotionless as they led outsiders to think, and she was fond of her husband and his idiosyncrasies.

He sang in the shower, and she laughed.

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They could have no children. They were not the same species and no matter what they did, there was no way for her to bear him his own children. But there were always war orphans to foster, and junior aides coming over to eat, and nieces and nephews to spoil rotten.

She tried not to think about the longing in his eyes when they visited his sister in the hospital after she had given birth to her third.

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Sometimes they went past their territory's borders, to the large unwieldy government that ruled most of the galaxy at that time. He had family there, and it was her job to know what was going on in the galaxy's major government. When they went to his uncle's funeral, though, there was no ulterior motive – just grief for a man her husband had loved greatly, and respect for a soldier who had beaten the odds his whole life and died in his sleep. It was there, touching not-so-little Myri's shoulder, that she came face to face with Jaina Solo.

She was heavily pregnant, and to the general public – indeed, to Karrde himself – the father was unknown. All that she said was, "They will be strong in the Force."

They stood staring at each other for an interminable moment in time, and then it was broken by her husband, walking over to her with red-rimmed eyes and lines around his mouth. He looked like he would fall into pieces if anyone said so much as hello, and she went to him, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, lending him support.

She couldn't suppress the peculiar sense of triumph that he had moved instinctively to her, though.

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At night, on the temperate plains world they had made their home, she watched him sleep. It was only when he was asleep that he looked so fragile and delicate. During the day, he dominated the landscape around him, effortlessly controlling his subordinates and manipulating his superiors, always moving, always tense. It was only in sleep he relaxed into a lump of flesh and blood, breathing slowly and calmly, rarely moving. It was the subject of a running joke between them.

She dwarfed him, really. She was a full foot taller than him, and was broader as well. She didn't usual notice during the day, but it was all too obvious at night. He looked alien, the opposite of everything she had ever wanted as a girl. His skin glowed white in the darkness, and his eyes were a sharp angry green rather than the placid red she saw in everyone else. But the scars – the scars were the same. She touched them, the raised scars from blades, and the warped skin from burns, and even the odd indent from punctures and shrapnel. But he never knew, because she only touched them when he slept.

She wondered, sometimes, if things would have been better if they had stayed with their own kind. But she dismissed it as a silly thought, because he iwas/i with his own kind. He was with her. And every night, a few hours after him, she would carefully curl around him (even though when he was awake, she wouldn't even ithink/i of doing that) and close her eyes. She was always elated to feel him turn around, even unconsciously, and burrow into her side.

When they woke up in the morning, they were entangled with each other, arms and legs winding around the other, his head tucked under her chin, like he was trying to get under her skin and stay there forever.

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She always remembered the first assassination attempt. They'd been married fifteen years then, and he was just coming into power as the Assistant Syndic. They'd had no Syndic since Thrawn. For all she knew, they would never have another Syndic. But she'd always remember the man with the greenish tint to his skin, and the slim old-fashioned plastic pistol he held in his hand. The pain wasn't that bad, and her husband was still alive, and that's all that mattered.

And while she's on the stretcher in the ambulance, he's sitting next to her, touching her cheeks gently with his calloused hands.

"Hey, I thought I was the hero here." It's a simple light-hearted statement, but she can see the strain underneath his eyes, trembling in his hands and tensed in the muscles of his jaw.

She just smiles, trying to reassure him without speaking.

"Well, I guess that's why I love you. All that repressed heroism…"

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When she woke up, she was in one of the bacta tanks, floating in the signature pink sea. She knew then how close she had come to dying, because there is little bacta in the Unknown regions. What little there is, is saved for those in true need of it, where surgery can do as much harm as good.

She sees her husband through the warped view of the tank, and puts her hand out, trying to get his attention. He comes over quickly, looking unshaven and tired, and rests his hand against hers'. She taps out _You should get some rest_.

He shakes his head and through the glass she sees him say _It doesn't matter_.

She purses her lips at him, but doesn't follow through with the usual admonishments. He leans his forehead against the cool transparisteel of the tank, and his face slackens. He looks much older than his forty-five years.

She taps out another sentence, right on his forehead.

_I love you._

He just looks at her, eyes tired but still sharp as a pin, and a big smile stretches across his face. Through the curved walls of the tank, she sees his reply.

_I know, Kyrn._


End file.
